


Grow Your Wings

by omg_wtf_yeah



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Community: sga_genficathon, Drama, Episode: s05e19 Vegas, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-20
Updated: 2011-07-20
Packaged: 2017-10-21 13:56:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/225948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/omg_wtf_yeah/pseuds/omg_wtf_yeah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At McKay's behest, Detective Sheppard returns to Area 51 after the events in <i>Vegas</i> but finds his ATA gene reluctant to cooperate. John/Rodney friendship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Grow Your Wings

John wakes up to the sleepy drip of the IV over his hospital bed, the tangerine colored sunrise over Las Vegas outside his window. For several minutes, he feels the world around him coalescing into something solid that makes sense, even if he doesn't really feel like putting the pieces together. It comes back to him slowly – a showdown in the red desert, a bullet in his side, waking briefly to the shuttering sound of copter blades slicing the sky as it bore down on him. So he guesses he isn't dead. It figures. He isn't bad at surviving – it's everyone else around him that could work on it.

A few minutes later, a nurse moves into his periphery, adjusting IVs and checking monitors. John weakly wets his lips, but the effort leaves him too tired to do much more than that. The nurse's face looms into his vision as it glazes over again. "Feeling a little better?" she asks in a cloying tone of bright optimism.

John lets his eyelids drift lower. He grunts unintelligibly.

"Let me just adjust this for you," the nurse says, and then John's out again.

Much later, after he graduates to blue jell-o, solid foods, and he's less fuzzy from pain meds, a quartet of Marines in stiff uniforms with stiff posture march into his room. He almost doesn't make a face and musters a lazy salute, but after three seconds of talking, John realizes that they're dead serious about being respectful to him. He'd laugh if the unhappy feeling in his chest wasn't so tight.

"You don't have to worry about me talking, you know," he mutters into his oatmeal, "I don't think the National Inquirer would buy the story. It's a little far-fetched." The Marines share a look amongst themselves, more alarmed than amused, and John leans back into his pillow with a sigh. "I'm kidding," he says.

"Of course you are," a strong, familiar voice comes from the doorway and when the Marines move to make way, John sees McKay, sharp as a blade in a black suit, "because then we'd have to kill you." John narrows his eyes without realizing it and McKay tilts his head back, looking appraisingly at John as though he could discern his state of health more accurately by looking at him than the doctors could using their tools of the trade. "That was a joke," he says after a beat.

"Ha," John replies sourly.

"Wait outside?" McKay asks the Marines and they promptly nod, dispersing in the same way they'd come in – effective, uniform.

"Nice trick," John says.

McKay peers blankly for a moment then says, "Oh, them." He stands straighter, his hands in his pockets. "You don't get where I am without knowing how to give orders."

John rolls his eyes at McKay's easy arrogance. "You guys must not have much to do if you're here."

"You might be surprised."

John's hazel eyes are sharp on McKay as the scientist sits in the chair beside his bed. "Try me," he replies.

"We want to offer you a job." John snorts and McKay goes on, "At Area 51. I only work there sometimes myself and when I do, I'll want your help. Ancient devices, that kind of thing—"

"No thanks."

"You haven't heard me out," McKay says with remarkable patience.

"I've heard enough and the answer's still no."

"If you do it, they'll consider expunging your record." McKay's words hang on the air. John's stare is rapier-sharp. After a moment, McKay smiles – it's not John's imagination that it looks less than happy on him. "I see that got your attention."

John's mouth dries and he swallows hard. "Not interested." His voice rasps over his dry tongue.

McKay's cheeks flush and his mouth curls in a dour moue. "I'm sorry to tell you that you don't have much of a choice."

"So what, I'm being drafted?" John asks. "You guys must be hard up for recruits if you're drafting me."

"It has to be you," McKay snaps. "No one on the planet has your rapport with Ancient technology. The other Sheppards—"

"If it's not up to me, why are you trying to sell me on it?" John interrupts.

McKay stares at John for a moment, his stare as brittle as John is. It's like seeing a reflection of himself – and John averts his eyes. "You're right," McKay says after a moment. "It's not a choice. Be at the base 0900 hours Monday. If you're not there, we'll arrange transportation." John snorts, thinking about the black Humvees rolling into the parking lot of the hospital, a small platoon of Marines in BDUs to hustle his wheelchair down the halls. He doesn't doubt for a minute that that is exactly what would happen if he isn't there.

***

John is barely back on his feet on Monday but he's at the gate of Area 51 at 0900 exactly. An armed Marine waves him through, his gaze lingering on John's face. John gets that treatment a lot around the base that day – everyone seems to know who he is. There are some reproachful looks mixed in with the curious and appreciative stares – why, John's not sure, but it's the kind of look he's gotten used to from fellow military.

McKay meets him outside the cafeteria, the tension of their last meeting seemingly forgotten. John follows McKay into his lab, a dank but sterile little room underground. John almost believes McKay chose it so he's far underground in case of unexpected attack. That idea doesn't seem to be completely out of the water.

"I wasn't sure you'd actually come," McKay says conversationally as they sit down on two metal stools at his workbench.

"Didn't think I had a choice," John says, his voice sunken in his chest. "Someone said something about an armed escort if I didn't show."

A hint of a smile ghosts on McKay's face. "Yes, well," he says, "that was a possibility. But for what it's worth, I was almost halfway that you'd show up, sooner or later."

Quick, sharp annoyance flashes through John at McKay's words. He's been pretty careful over the years that no one expects anything from him. One shoot out with an alien in the desert and people wanted to call him a hero. John doesn't want any part of that. "I wouldn't build my expectations too high if I were you."

"We'll start out with a personal shield. It should pose no problems for you—"

John picks up the palm-sized jewel McKay proffers and stares at it. The deep green crystal is veined with silver inlay – it's less delicate than Ancient tech usually is, which, of course, John doesn't know; to John, it looks blunt and ugly. He huffs, looking down at the crystal. It remains inert and dark in the center of his palm. He flips it over and stares expectantly down at it. He waits, watching it. "It's not working," he says after a moment.

McKay looks down at the shield. "Hmm? Maybe it's broken." He pushes another small object, metal and crystal, into John's palm. "Try this one."

John looks at it then at McKay, raising his eyebrows. "It's not doing anything."

"Of course not," McKay retorts, "you have to think at it."

"Think at it," John mutters unhappily. As dumb as it sounds, he does what McKay tells him to – he thinks at it. _On, turn on, start working, do it…_ He flips the device over and over in his palm, running his thumb over the multifaceted surface of the crystal like a worry stone. He keeps thinking at it and nothing is happening. The crystal remains dark in his hand.

"Try this one," McKay insists, shoving another device, one that looks like a defibrillator, into John's hands. "According to the other Sheppard and Keller, you have the strongest expression of the ATA gene anyone has ever seen. It's either a faulty device or user error." John narrows his eyes at McKay and resists the urge to make a smart retort, focusing instead on turning the damn thing on.

An hour later, the table is littered with bric-a-brac, a stupid clutter of incomprehensible odds and ends that probably makes sense to McKay but means nothing to Sheppard. Even if he was tiptop, which he still isn't, he couldn't figure what an oblong crystal or the tackiest brooch ever made might do. And either way, his temples are starting to ache.

"Try this one," McKay says, pushing an L-shaped thing also made of metal and crystal across the table top.

Sheppard levels a smart-assed look at McKay. "My wound's acting up."

"I wouldn't be surprised." Before John can say anything to that, McKay says, "Fine. That's about enough for today. You can go."

John flicks his eyes toward the ceiling, suppressing the urge to retort, _Thanks for telling me_. He stands up and leaves without a backwards glance.

***

Over the course of the next two weeks, John finds out that the torture sessions will continue until McKay's time earthside runs out and he goes back to Atlantis, what McKay stridently calls ‘the City of the Ancients.' The next ten times McKay drags John out to the base under threat of a military escort, John goes over the backlog of Ancient artifacts by touch. McKay explains ‘This does this, that does that,' the words sliding through John's consciousness with all the grip of tube socks on a polished floor.

When John comes in at the regular time on Wednesday, he stops short in the doorway, seeing unfamiliar shoulders at McKay's regular lab bench. He can recognize the thinning hair around a bald head and the brightly patterned shirt – it's a scientist he's seen around the base but never officially talked to.

As John turns to go back the other way, he nearly collides with a small man walking briskly through the doorway, his face buried in a file folder. The guy jerks back just in time, juggling his papers and muttering lowly to himself. John recognizes this scientist, too – the one who'd disagreed vehemently with McKay the first time John had been to the base. Radek Zelenka. "Detective Sheppard," he says.

"Ex-detective," John corrects.

Zelenka doesn't react to John's correction, straightening his blazer after straightening his papers. "If you're looking for Dr. McKay, he's not here. He said that when you came by, you should meet him in the warehouse."

"The warehouse?" John echoes. Zelenka nods his agreement and John turns to go. "Thanks, doc."

"Good luck," the other guy says from the lab bench.

John half-heartedly thanks him and goes back out into the hallway. With McKay's disbelief in a standard work week and his penchant for long hours, John's had plenty of time to explore the labyrinthine halls of the main Area 51 compound, pretending to search for washrooms and the mess hall wherever they let him go (which is everywhere) whenever he gets seriously sick of not turning Ancient devices on. He gets turned around a couple times before he finds the warehouse.

A Marine lets him in with a speculative glance at him. John shares his doubt – when John left the Air Force, he'd never thought he'd be working with them again. He'd buried everything, the good and the bad, that came with being a serviceman when they discharged him. After his final tour, it was all bad memories.

The cool blue wash of light and air-conditioning is almost stinging after the orange sunlight and the desert heat outside. John looks around the main floor of the warehouse, seeing the weird assortment of alien machinery arranged around the room and outlined with yellow and black tape on the floor beneath them. John scans the room for McKay's figure but from what he can see, he's alone.

John starts looking, his footsteps scraping on the cement floor and reverberating through the rafters high above. He looks over the aircrafts and feels a bittersweet frisson of excitement at the idea of somebody flying these things. John ignores it and walks back toward the bare metal stairs to the catwalk. He's barely laid his hand on the railing when he feels a prickle along the nape of his neck. His hand tenses on the railing, his narrow, hazel eyes sweeping over the room over his shoulder.

Lonely in the far corner of the room, there's a new addition to the fleet. It's a funny looking tin-can of a ship, dull and inert in the corner like an abandoned toy. John tamps down on a kneejerk sympathetic reaction – in his time as a pilot, he'd conveyed human characteristics on the planes he flew as much as anyone else did (sometimes more), but it's a little extreme to sympathize with an alien aircraft.

He swallows hard, his mind going to his half-started search for McKay. His hand softens on the railing and he lets go, walking back to the little ship in the corner. The overheads run over the smooth, pewter-colored metal flank of the ship as John approaches, catching on the deeply imprinted pattern on its side. A tingle spreads over John's scalp and shoulders as he comes near it. Standing close to it, he feels the ship like a tangible thrum in his frame.

There's a sense like an itch in his consciousness, a kind of hyperawareness of the machine, while the other Ancient tech left him devoid of a connection, something stirs in him at the aircraft's presence. John lays his hand on the hull and feels a tingle warming his skin, the metal cool under his fingertips. He walks around the front of the ship, peering up into the impenetrable darkness of the cockpit.

"We call it a Gateship."

John whips his head aside, surprised that McKay managed to sneak up on him like that. Of the many characteristics one would put to McKay, stealthy ranks low on the list. "Gateship?" John asks, "a little puddle jumper like this?" He shakes his head.

"I believe that with a little thought towards what we've told you, you'd agree that Gateship is an accurate and–"

"Should call it a Puddlejumper instead. _that's_ accurate." John walks away from McKay's incredulous expression, around the back of the ship and stops short as the hatch door descends in front of him. John glances over his shoulder and sees McKay holding what looks like a palm-sized remote control.

"We have time for a small detour before we move on to the chair."

‘The chair' sounds almost as pleasant as seven straight hours of not turning things on. John makes a face, feeling like a defective human light switch. But his awareness of the ship is distracting, a sense of its nearness spreading over him like the feeling of the sun's warmth and light on his skin – it's a sense that permeates his body. He hesitates as he comes to the ramp inside.

McKay walks briskly into the ship ahead of him, hands in his pockets like he's taking a stroll. John looks around the back compartment where two long bench seats face one another under heavy cargo nets, before turning back to McKay. After a beat, John walks up the grated ramp into the machine, a prickle of energy enlivening his skin. As he steps inside, the ramp lifts at his back. McKay brushes past John, his brows furling in shock as the hatch door closes securely with a little airtight whoosh.

"That's not supposed to happen?" John supposes.

McKay shoots a distracted glance at him. "What? No, I meant for it to do that without asking. I've been working on this form of sentient technology interface for some time now because I prefer machinery to do before asking—" he breaks off in a huff, "No, that was not supposed to happen." He points his remote at the door and clicks it, waiting for the door to respond. The ship remains as oblivious to McKay's commands as all the other Ancient technology resolutely ignores John's orders. "Damn it." McKay mutters, clicking the remote once, twice, then three times in quick succession.

"Maybe the battery's dead," John suggests glibly. His lips quirk up as McKay fires a murderous glare at him.

"Thank you for the unhelpful suggestion. Perhaps you have another?"

John settles back against the door, a small smile on his face. It was more than a little gratifying, watching McKay struggle with his Ancient tech rapport after all the frustration John's met with in the past week and a half.

"This is just a minor malfunction," McKay announces, flipping an overhead panel down. The light from the display glows on the scientist's face as he begins what John presumes are system overrides.

John looks away from him. "So this is a space ship?" he asks, his hazel eyes flicking over the walls and the doors, the empty cargo nets and the open panel above McKay.

McKay flashes him a smirk. "No, we use it for milk runs to the 7-Eleven."

John arches an eyebrow at him. "How're the overrides going?" he asks, trying to get McKay's goat.

McKay makes a face, turning back to the overhead. "Two minutes," he declares. As if to emphasize his point, he switches two crystals. "And…," he points to the hatch door.

John straightens up, expecting the door to open. But nothing happens. "That's the desired effect?" he asks.

McKay's face crumples unhappily. "Hmm, no. It's fine. I know how to repair this. I'll just…," he trails off as the inner door slides open, revealing the cockpit and a wide front window now translucent.

As the door opens, a new sensation washes over John – a sense of connection – his forehead creases with his frown, trying to shrug off this new feeling. He can feel McKay's blue eyes on him like a weight on his shoulders, the scientist's face clouded with confusion. "Cockpit," John states simply. If all else fails, play dumb. McKay grunts agreement, his gaze becoming patient and speculative as he follows John into the front compartment.

The clean white walls of the hangar in front of them couldn't be further from the Nevada desert outside the compound, the Nevada John knows, but it reminds him that he's still here. He's still terrestrial – tethered to the failures and disappointments that brought him to the seedy desert. For now, he ignores the impression of his lousy past and he moves forward between the captain's chairs in the back, until he can see the instrument array spread out in front of the pilot and copilot seats.

As John sits in the pilot chair, McKay slides into the copilot's seat, still regarding John and not bothering to touch the controls. John doesn't know if McKay even can fly it. McKay seems familiar with the machine itself regardless.

The tingle he'd felt before vibrates through John's body as he sits in front of the instruments. He chooses to ignore it, pretending not to notice it even as McKay watches him for signs of connection. John reaches out, his hand hovering over the controls without touching.

Light splashes over the left side of John's face and he looks up, surprised by the display overlaying his view of the hangar bay. "It's the HUD – Heads Up Display," McKay says from the copilot's seat. John glances at him. It's a dumb name. John reaches out and the warehouse outside moves around them, sinking lower in the view screen.

McKay sits ramrod straight. "What're you doing?" he asks, alarmed.

John's dark eyebrows furl. "I'm not doing anything," he protests.

"You must've touched something."

"You can see my hands, McKay. I'm not touching anything."

Three Marines in BDUs jog over and a voice crackles on the radio, demanding to know why the gateship is preparing for flight.

McKay lurches forward, touching the controls. "This is Dr. McKay and Detective Sheppard in Gateship 1. Repeat – this is Dr. McKay and Detective Sheppard in Gateship 1. Do not fire."

After a pause, the Marines relax and the Marine at the front touches her radio, speaking through the comm, "Are you cleared for flight today, Dr. McKay?"

McKay glances at John and John narrows his eyes at him, unwilling to accept the blame for why they're hovering five feet off the hangar floor. "You know what my clearance is," McKay snaps. "Which would be—"

"Yes, sir. Of course," the Marine says, slapping the man beside her to move back.

"Okay," McKay says to John, "you've had your fun. I suggest taking it—" he breaks off as the ship slips upward, nose turning gracefully skyward. "What are you doing now?"

"I'm not doing anything," John retorts. "I'll try to take her down." But when he touches the control, the ship slides smoothly forward, moving toward the hangar doors.

"That's not down." John narrows his eyes at McKay and McKay sighs, flicking his eyes to the ceiling. "Fine." He leans forward and radios control.

John doesn't pay much attention as Rodney calls in. He's overwhelmed by the feeling of being in the cockpit once more, off the ground if only by a few feet. "I'll explain later," Rodney says over the comm, which seems to finish it and they get the official go ahead.

Turning back to John, McKay asks, "Can you fly this thing?"

"I'm not flying it now."

McKay sighs. "That's comforting."

The ship moves toward the doors and John steels himself as they begin to slide open. Sunlight washes over the nose of the ship, and though John makes no conscious effort to control it, the ship slides through the doors into the sunshine. The doors open to drab uniform buildings surrounding the airstrip and chain link fences flanking it. "Can you fly this?" John asks after a beat, looking narrowly at the scientist.

McKay meets his gaze and cringes. "Yes and no."

John rolls his eyes, touching the controls to take her to earth. Instead, the ship rises skyward, blue sky and white clouds unfurling across the viewscreen over the uniform bulidings. There's a shift in John's senses as the orange desert and blue sky over it spread out and out in the window – suddenly, John can understand the display and acutely feel the aircraft around him, ready to spring to action at John's command. He touches the controls.

This isn't like flying a plane. It's like flying himself. Between the manual controls and the rapport with the gateship flirting with the edges of John's consciousness, it's like John makes the climb into the clouds himself. He turns them heavenward, rocketing up through the sky. They're a hundred feet high, then a mile, the wisps of cloud slipping over the ship. Then pausing above the clouds, John levels the ship. The base is a small shape in the midst of a red desert, mountains stretching out in the distance, the glow of sunset on the horizon.

"You can take it higher," McKay says.

John glances at him. Apprehension chokes him. He's in the air again. Though he'd walked away from it when they'd discharged him and he'd buried it and everything else from his past when he went to Vegas, he's flying again. He takes it higher. The ship moves effortlessly through the sky, making the steep climb. It feels like John's past burns away as the ship pierces the sky, until the very curve of the atmosphere arcs beneath the ship – glowing translucent blue in a field of stars. John's lips curve.

"You missed flying." McKay's voice breaks John from his thoughts.

John regards him with an expression more vulnerable and troubled than John ever wants to let on. "Yeah," he admits after a moment.

McKay nods. "We can offer you this, you know," he says. John's forehead creases. "I spoke to Dr. Elizabeth Weir about it already. We both agree that you would be a useful addition to the expedition. And we want to offer you a job."

"A job," John repeats dumbly, numb and unthinking from the recent events. Distantly, he imagines what that job might entail. And the memory of being a serviceman returns – the sense of belonging he'd looked for as a kid and gave up on when he was discharged.

"Technical advisor and military liaison."

John swallows with difficulty. "I'm going to have to think about it," he mutters.

"No, you don't."

John glances at McKay, his eyes pained, and McKay holds his gaze with bold candor. John can't handle it right now. For all John's feigned indifference, he knows it's clear how much he's longed for the sky since the US Air Force discharged him. He grasps the controls to belie the shaking of his hands as he pilots them back to earth.

The way down seems shorter than the way up did. Now fully in control, John pilots the craft with the confidence he'd been missing when he'd walked into the hangar bay. John still isn't ready to admit to himself how fractured he's been without it. All this time, he's told himself he's fine going it alone – it's what he deserves and what he's used to – but flying the gateship (the jumper) with McKay in the copilot chair reminds him more acutely of everything he's lost. And the chance he could get it back again. The open air, camaraderie. A city in the middle of the ocean in a distant galaxy that may welcome him when he comes home.

When they touch back down, perfectly centered in the tape outlines and the barricades, McKay takes something out of his pocket. "Here."

John looks over, then warily extends his hand. McKay drops a small crystal into John's palm – the personal shield. On contact, the crystal lights up, glowing green in the center of his open hand, and John looks down at it in surprise. McKay smiles as though he's proven himself right, but he doesn't explain and John lets it go, pocketing the artifact to return it to McKay's lab later.

"I'm leaving on the Daedalus Friday morning, 0700 hours." The usual time as far as McKay is concerned. "If you're here at seven, the job is yours."

John stares at McKay, his green eyes wary, and he remains silent. McKay rises from his chair without waiting, walking back into the rear compartment. As John meets him, the rear hatch opens freely, permitting the cool air.

"You can go. I think that's enough for today," McKay says, indicating the far door.

John glances over at it then back at McKay's already-retreating form. He stares for a while as McKay walks through another door and away, back to work or wherever he might be going. After a moment, John walks down the ramp and the hatch closes back up behind him – this time with John's conscious say-so. He leaves the personal shield with the Marine who'd questioned them before, then walks out into the melting colors of the desert sunset.

His heart pounds in his chest, the feeling in his chest tight and bittersweet as he slips his aviators back on and squints up at the orange and violet clouds layering the horizon. McKay called it right. The scientist has an alarming propensity to do that. John already knows what his answer will be. He'd decided it the moment daylight had broken over the nose of the ship. John knows he'll take the job. He knows that he'll go to Atlantis and he knows he's going to grow his wings again.

**Author's Note:**

> Rewatching _Vegas_ , I got to thinking about how much the conscious and subconscious comes into John's rapport with Ancient technology. Though he has a dark back story that brought him to McMurdo and he's far from emotionally forthcoming, Default!John is much lighter emotionally than Vegas!John is, so I wondered if Vegas!John might be capable of subconsciously blocking his connection with Ancient tech as an extension of his refusal of connection with the people in Vegas-verse. Quote from _Rising Part 2_.


End file.
